Theme: The Caribbean must be judged by its own traditions.
Traditions are qualitatively understood. The foundations of
Caribbean politics rest on geography, history and culture
(topics 1,2,3). It is upon these that we study the main
challenges of Caribbean societies, this being empowerment
through democracy and development (topics 4,5). At the same
time we conduct this study through a Caribbean political
science in order to overcome some biases of the traditional
discipline.

1.POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY: (Physical Attributes)

- Spatial Analysis
- Size, Location, Ecology.

Mainstream political science has ignored Caribbean political
systems on two grounds: one is that being so small they are
relatively simple societies and easily governed. Therefore
they have few lessons of interest for the study of politics.

This reflects a bias of traditional political science because
of its emergence in the 'big' countries. Small states are
worth studying comparatively because they comprise about
one-half of all countries so to ignore them would be to ignore
a large portion of the universe of political systems. At any
rate size and geography constitute structures in their own
right that explain much about politics and its context. It is
what is explained by geography that is discussed in this
section.

2. POLITICAL HISTORY:

- Historical Analysis.
- The Barbados Model.

The other ground on which mainstream political science has
ignored Anglo-Caribbean states is that of their relative
newness, gaining political Independence only in the 1960's,
1970's and 1980's. They do not, it is therefore said, have an
established history of modern politics on which one can
safely make judgements over a sufficiently long period of time.
Of course, this argument loses force with each passing year
and certainly countries like Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados and
Guyana have been independent for over 35 years now and have
had modern party and electoral systems going back to the 1940's
and 1950's. Surely this is history enough.

I will argue that even the Caribbean's longer colonial history
has been very important in shaping the different ways that
these countries respond to their contemporary world. I centre
the discussion on Barbados which represents a distinct pattern
of historical development and then discuss the other countries
and their points of departure from this 'Barbados model'.

3. POLITICAL CULTURE:

- Cultural Analysis
- Ideas, Nationalism, Values,.

Mainstream political science has studied political culture in
order to understand what cultural conditions support liberal
democracy and political stability. It has largely ignored the
Caribbean supposedly on the presumption that since the Anglo-
Caribbean countries are stable and democratic then the culture
is democratic. Nonetheless changes in civic culture values
need to be assessed and indeed, the Caribbean might have its
own cultural complements of democracy and stability which are
different from those of North America and Europe.

We will study the Anglo-American cultural impact along with
the Caribbean's creole culture and the foundational ideas
and values lodged in music, religion, and nationalism to see
how they define Caribbean social and political identity.

4. POLITICAL LEADERSHIP.

- Leadership
- Personalities
- Style

The Founding Father's of the modern Caribbean contributed
their own style of leadership which was often middle class
and charismatic. This style and the personalities behind it
had a different impact under the conditions of separate
Caribbean countries and in the context of emerging nations.
The nature of leadership will be studies separate from the
structure of political systems and its importance in the
formative period of mass politics and nationalism.

Democratic theory is an evolving one. The present "wave" of
democratization and the renewed popularity of its study in
political science must be enriched by its regional
variations and the adaptation of older traditions to new
designs. Leading scholars of this wave (Huntington, Diamond)
have said very little about the Caribbean in this regard.

The Caribbean is a product of two traditions of politics:
the Anglo-American and the Latin American. These traditions
find new expression in the Caribbean context against the
background of geography, history and culture. How are these
traditions being modernized and Caribbeanized? How do these
traditions help or hinder the Caribbean's attempts to meet
contemporary democratic and developmental expectations? How
does the Caribbean compare with other regions on measures of
democracy and human rights? These are the main questions in
this study.

6. CARIBBEAN CIVIL SOCIETIES.

- Civil society
- main organizations and impact

The emergence of the modern Caribbean was influenced by the
role of civil society organizations such as the church, the
media, trade unions, and professional as well as voluntary
organizations. Their role has contributed to the character
of democracy, interest group politics and the political
culture. The most important of these organizations need to be
studied especially because they have been neglected in the
past and are only now being appreciated because of the new
emphasis on 'civil society'.

7. THE POST-COLONIAL STATE.

- The State in late-decolonization
- The nationalist State
- The State under structural adjustment

The Caribbean state has undergone three phases of development.
The first was that of the colonial state in the period of
decolonization. The second was that of the nationalist state
in the period of early Independence. The third, covers the
present period from the mid-1980's in the period of
'good governance'. We will investigate the different purposes
that these state forms served and the forces that created them.
Modern reforms will be understood as an effort to further
de-colonize the state while making it more democratic and
service oriented.

8. THE CARIBBEAN ABROAD.

- The Movement of Caribbean Peoples
- The Global Caribbean
- The impact of overseas communities on home societies.

The movement of Caribbean peoples has been studied by migration
theory. The main concern has been with push and pull factors -
what makes people leave their home country and what
opportunities attract them away. A new emphasis, fifty years
after the modern era of Caribbean migration began, must be to
consider what this transnational community of Caribbean peoples
represent in world politics, world culture and the world economy
and how the migrant societies can contribute to the development
of the home societies.

The Caribbean is usually defined by geography. However the
movement of Caribbean peoples and cultures have established a
wider transnational Caribbean and new linkages between the
Caribbean home and the host communities abroad. These linkages
have important consequences -positive and negative - for the
future of the geographical Caribbean. We will look at the main
linkages and their consequences and adapt migration theory to
these.

Robert Buddan
Department of Government
June 28, 1999.

GT22D - POLITICS IN THE CARIBBEAN.

Theme: The Caribbean must be judged by international standards.
This is the expectation of those who make assessments of
political systems around the world and how those systems perform.
Such assessments rely largely on quantitative comparative
measurements. This is the approach taken here. It relies heavily
on a data base of Caribbean political variables.

1. ELECTIONS AND ELECTORAL SYSTEMS.

- Different electoral systems.
- Electoral controversies.

Democracy is often measured by a minimal standard of free and
fair elections. We explain the major electoral systems of the
Caribbean and ask how free and fair are elections in the
different countries. The different electoral systems of the
English and non-English speaking countries will be compared on
the basis of freeness and fairness. Current issues of electoral
reform will be addressed.

2. POLITICAL PARTIES AND PARTY SYSTEMS.

- Party Systems.
- Dominant Party Patterns.
- New Parties and Party dynamics.

Democracy is measured by the competitiveness of party systems
and the nature of choice between parties, that is what parties
stand for.We want to know how symmetrical power is between the
parties, how competitive party systems are, and how well they
perform their roles and functions in light of new non-party
forces of participation and representation. In many Caribbean
societies, new parties are emerging and promise to change the
fundamental nature of party politics. Caribbean politics is
therefore moving from a more simple to a complex dimension of
party politics.

3. HUMAN RIGHTS AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT.

- The state of human rights.
- The state of human development.
- The comapartive performance of Caribbean countries.

Democracy is measured by the extent to which human rights are
respected but the performance of government is assessed by the
degree to which human development is satisfied. The state of
human development affects the state of democracy. Caribbean
governments are compared with each other and with other
countries in these two areas. The quality of human life,
standards of living, and equity have implications for levels
of satisfaction or dissatisfaction and for political stability
in the region. The relative successes and failures of the
region on these measures will be looked at.

4. CRIME, CORRUPTION AND JUSTICE.

- The nature of crime and corruption.
- The nature of justice.
- The state and security.

The state of crime and corruption reveal much about the
state of democracy, human rights, human and moral development.
High levels of crime undermine the right to personal security
and a high-security state in turn represents a potential threat
to personal freedom and justice. Corruption causes both waste
and discrimination which undermine a government's performance
and trust in public officials. Furthermore, crime and
corruption affect the environment within which markets and
market rules best operate. In these ways and for these reasons
market democracies are assessed in the context of levels of crime
and corruption. In all of this, the state and the security forces
of the region have become controversial for the roles they play.

5. RACE, ETHNICITY AND CLASS.

- Race, Ethnicity and Class.
- Impact on Politics.

Democracy rests on the principle of non-discrimination. It
treats the voter/taxpayer as citizen in abstract from his or
her ascriptive attributes. Caribbean societies are multi-ethnic,
multi-racial and class societies. A good test of the principle
of non-discrimination is the extent to which patronage is based
on ascriptive criteria as against distributive justice or merit.
Controversies over discrimination will be looked at in the
context of human rights and equity, as well as the potential for
political tribalism and instability.

The small and sometimes fragile democracies of the Caribbean
and experienced different forms of opposition to the status quo.
It is important to identify the social, economic and political
sources of opposition movements, how their demands are coped with,
what successes they have achieved and what has accounted for
their failures. The history of the Caribbean is in a sense a
history of opposition. It is necessary to see how relatively new
democracies cope with the problems of consolidating democracy in
the face of multi-ethnic, multi-class and developmental concerns
over equity and political inclusion.

7. MODERNIZING DEMOCRACY.

- Constitutional Reform.
- Political Modernization.

The political models inherited from colonialism have come under
much criticism in recent times. Caribbean political leaders have
responded with varying degrees for constitutional reform. A
comparison of these reform efforts will be made as well as
judgments about how adequate and far-reaching they promise to be.
Political modernization will be discussed in light of the new
international emphasis on democracy and human rights along with a
new and autonomous space for the maturation of civil society.

8. THE GLOBAL CARIBBEAN.

- The Wider Caribbean.
- The state of Caribbean Integration.
- The impact of globalism and Development Models.

The challenges facing Caribbean Politics and societies include
those caused by globalization. The experience of small economies,
societies and polities in a world that is undergoing structural
transformation and how well these societies cope with this, s of
interest here. Globalization offers both positive and negative
consequences for the region. The two sides of globalization will
be looked at and how the region must adjust to make the best of
the opportunities evolving.Deveopmental theory in the Caribbean
has been influenced by the major schools among neo-classical and
political-economy approaches. At present, international
developmentalorganizations (IMF, World Bank, UNDP) seem to have
more influence in programming development as against the earlier
tradition of theorizing development.

Caribbean governments have explored and practiced different
models of economic development. They broadly fall under a
liberal-market model and a statist basic needs model. However,
there have been important variants among these. Three important
variants are the Cuban revolutionary model, the Off-Shore model
and a liberal adjustment model. We must ask what account for
these variations and what are the comparative strengths and
weaknesses of each. Importantly, we must consider how
successfully these models meet the needs of Caribbean peoples
towards providing a better quality of life.